Libyan Culture on The Brink of Change

London-based author Hisham Matar is of Libyan parentage and has been in close touch with his friends in Tripoli. He talks with anchor Marco Werman about the anxieties of a society on the brink of change.

Excerpt from the interview:
“The collective imagination of Libyans has been trapped and suddenly the horizon has moved to a different place. The view of the future is very different. Exactly because Gaddafi didn’t just die of old age, the fact that he has been pushed off his throne by the same people who are going to make the future … it gives them a sense of ownership of it.

“And not only for Libya. I think what Gaddafi was trying to do over the last six months is give a masterclass to people like Bashar al-Assad and other dictators, he’s tried to give a masterclass on how you crush an uprising. What the Libya people have done is proven that he has failed.”

Hisham Matar, author of “Anatomy of Disappearance”